Branding originated as a means by which a company differentiated its goods and/or services compared to its competitors (Cowley, 1991). The importance of brand management in tourism and hospitality has become more important than ever as the sectors have become mature, global and highly competitive. Hitherto, the creation of strong brands was the result of passive or responsive marketing involvement by brand managers on consumers (Brown, Kozinets, and Sherry, 2003). Recent literature on marketing and brand management, however, suggests that strong brands are generated from a co-creation process, involving consumers’ active engagement (Boyle, 2007). For example, Coupland, Iacobucci, and Arnould (2005, p. 107) comment that “the consumer is an active partner with the marketer in brand-meaning formation”, whilst Brown et al. (2003, p. 30) note “the brand is a milieu where marketing management and consumer commitment co-exist”.

Tourism and hospitality deal with experiential products and are at the forefront of cocreation (Buhalis &amp; Foerste, 2015) so that the integration of brand management and co-creation is now a crucial issue (Buhalis and Inversini, 2014). In terms of inseparability, one of the service characteristics, the service environment implies the involvement of consumers in the entire service process – including the production and consumption stages (Middleton, Fyall, Morgan, Morgan, and Ranchhod, 2009). Moreover, the development of information technology (e.g. TripAdvisor, Booking, and Expedia) facilitates the sharing of consumer service experiences and their positive or negative reflections as part of co-creation activities, which potentially informs brand development and reputation (Binkhorst and Den Dekker, 2009; Au, Buhalis and Law, 2014). Numerous studies in tourism and hospitality have discussed the brand management and co-creation, separately. However, academic attempts to integrate two important themes are more limited. Therefore, the purpose of this special issue in JPBM is to explore brand management and co-creation in tourism and hospitality contexts using a variety of issues/concepts/examples. We invite submissions on a broad range of tourism and hospitality branding topics in this regard, and welcome both conceptual and empirical contributions.

• Papers need to be submitted online to the Special Issue on “Brand management and cocreation: lessons from tourism and hospitality” through the ScholarOne System (http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/jpbm).

• For informal enquiries you can contact the guest editors.

• Submissions will be blind-reviewed by at least two reviewers.

• Based on the reviewers’ recommendation, the guest editors and the Editors-in-Chief will decide whether the particular submission is accepted as it is, revised and re-submitted, or rejected.

Deadline for submissions 1 September 2019.The Scholar 1 site will not open for submissions until 1 August 2019.

The site will remain open for one month until 1 September 2019.

Submissions to the special issue can only be made during this window and should be made by selecting the special issue from the drop down menu which will become available on 1 August 2019. The planned publication is early 2021.